Outside, the bells of St. James Church began to ring, announcing that Christmas Eve had officially arrived. Neighbors greeted each other on the street, loaded with gifts and smiles. Children ran in their new coats, and families headed toward houses where tables full of love and hot food awaited them.
I was still sitting in my empty kitchen, but something was being born inside me—something that had been waiting 33 years to awaken.
That night, I couldn’t sleep. I lay awake in the master bed I had shared with my husband Arthur for 20 years, staring at the water stains on the ceiling that I had never dared to fix because I had to save for the grandchildren’s expenses. The heat was on low as always because every dollar I didn’t spend on myself was a dollar I could send to Michael’s account when he asked for help. And boy, had he asked for help over the years.
I closed my eyes and the images came like a painful avalanche. I remembered that February morning in 2010 when Michael showed up at my door with red eyes and a crumpled paper in his hand. It was a foreclosure notice. His consulting firm had just gone bankrupt, and he had co-signed a personal loan for $80,000.
“Mom, I’m going to lose everything,” he had cried like a child who had fallen off his bike. “Jessica is pregnant with Caleb. We can’t end up on the street. Only you can help me.”
I didn’t have $80,000, but I had the house. I mortgaged it without a second thought, putting it up as collateral so the bank would lend my son the money. Arthur had died three years earlier, and that house was the only thing I had left of him. But what was an empty house compared to the happiness of my only son?
“I’ll pay you back, Mom. I swear. In two years, tops,” he had promised as he completed the forms that turned my home into a mortgaged property.
Fourteen years had passed. The mortgage was still not fully paid off.
But it wasn’t just that. In 2012, when Khloe was born, Jessica had come to see me with that charming smile she knew how to put on when she needed something.
“Eleanor, dear, we need your help again. The kids need to go to a good private school. It costs $800 a month each, but it’s an investment in their future. You understand, right? As a grandmother, you want the best for them.”
$800 for each grandchild. $1,600 a month.
My widow’s pension was $950 monthly. I had to find a job cleaning offices at night, at the age of 62, to cover the difference. My knees were destroyed going up and down stairs. My back bent from carrying buckets of water. But every month, I transferred that $1,600 so Caleb and Khloe could go to the best school in the area.
“It’s temporary, Eleanor,” Jessica would tell me every time I mentioned how hard it was to keep up that pace. “Michael is going to get a promotion soon, and then we’ll be able to handle it ourselves.”
The promotion never came—or it came, but there were always new expenses. The school uniforms. The private English lessons. The extracurricular activities. Summer camp on the East Coast. Always something more.
I sat up in bed and walked to Arthur’s desk, where I kept all the receipts and transaction slips in an old shoebox. I opened it with trembling hands and began to do the math. The yellowed papers told a story of limitless generosity and nonexistent gratitude.
March 2013: $3,000 for Michael’s new car. “It’s for his job, Mom. A consultant needs to project a good image.”
July 2014: $5,000 for the family vacation to Florida. “The kids need to breathe the sea air, Eleanor. It’s for their health.”
December 2015: $2,500 for Christmas presents. “We want Caleb and Chloe to have a special Christmas like the ones you gave us.”
A Christmas I spent completely alone, because they were too tired after opening the presents I had paid for.
The numbers danced before my tired eyes. In total, over 14 years, I had given my son and his family more than $200,000—$200,000 that had come from my home’s mortgage, from my life savings, from extra hours working as a cleaner until I was 70, from dinners of canned tuna so I could save every penny.
And yet, when I called to ask them to visit, they always had excuses. Michael was too busy with work. Jessica had a migraine. The kids had homework. The traffic was impossible. It was raining too hard. It was too hot.
I remembered the last time they had come to the house. It had been in April—eight months ago. Jessica had walked in with that expression she made when she disliked something, barely touching the furniture with her fingertips as if it might infect her.
“Eleanor, this house urgently needs a renovation,” she had said, wrinkling her nose. “It smells musty. The furniture is outdated, and the kitchen looks like it’s from the ’70s. The kids get bored here. There’s no Wi-Fi, no flat-screen TV. There’s nothing they like.”
She had paused, looking at the photographs of Arthur I had on the sideboard, and added with a sigh of annoyance, “Besides, all these pictures of dead people and memories of the past make them sad. Caleb asked me why his grandmother lives surrounded by ghosts.”
Michael had remained silent, looking at his phone, occasionally nodding at his wife’s words. When he finally spoke, it was to deliver the final blow.
“Mom, maybe you should think about selling this house and moving into a nursing home. You’d have more company. You’d be with people your own age, and we wouldn’t have to worry about you constantly.”
Worry about me.
When had they shown the slightest concern for my well-being, my loneliness, my health?
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